[Front-paged by susanhu. This has been rumbling around in my tummy too, and I think Antifa has nailed it!]
Keep your eye on the prize, people. Fitzgerald is turning Libby, and not in exchange for more Plame leakers, either.
Fitzgerald said today that this investigation isn’t over. Believe it.
Here’s how this is going down:
Libby stuck to a patently false story; a story that protected other players.
Libby “sticking to my story” did not work — Libby is busted in detail; he’s up the creek for 30 years.
He really is. Fitzgerald only charged Libby with what he can convict him on without the slightest doubt about it. So, Libby has the proverbial horse’s head in his bed. An offer he can’t refuse. . . which means Libby now needs to seek a deal, soon, in return for fewer years in the Federal Penitentiary. If he doesn’t, he’ll have to watch someone else make the deal Fitz is after, leaving Libby to do all 30 seasons in the slammer.
But Libby will find that no deal is available for naming other Plame leakers. Fuggeddaboudid. That’s so last week.
Fitzgerald already has all the leakers and all the proof he needs to convict them when he chooses.
So, what does Fitz want?
He wants someone who sat in on those White House Iraq Group meetings to tell all. Joseph Valachi style. Unzip this crime family from the inside.
Much more below:
A confession so thorough it will satisfy Fitzgerald’s Jesuit soul.
If Fitzgerald appears to be playing with peanuts, well it’s because there’s an elephant in the room, and he wants that elephant to follow him over to the courthouse.
Fitz does not consider the Plame leak to be the core crime. The core crime is lying the nation into war.
The secondary crime is hiding that original lying, that original “high crime in public office.” Third is the conspiracy aspects of this original lying and the coverup of the original lying. Fourth is the Plame leak, which was both an incident and a conspiracy to scare a truth-telling whistleblower into silence. Fifth is conspiring to cover up that leak.
Pardon the pun, or don’t — but Fitzgerald is playing Big Time.
Spin won’t affect this, and neither will pardoning these lower level players, one by one. Fitz will just go after the next Plame-stained leaker, and turn them.
Because he’s looking for his Joseph Valachi, his goombah who wants to live free, not a neocon forgotten in jail.
As long as Fitzgerald stays out of small airplanes, he will methodically feed lower level members of this crime family into a legal meatgrinder to turn them from their ideology and vow of omerta. As each one unzips the Bush crime family, in exchange for measured clemency, Fitz will have a tighter grip on the next one up.
All the way up. And it won’t take long.
So, Happy Halloween, folks!
You ain’t seen Fitzmas yet.
I bet you are correct with this!
This is the real Fitzmas present – a holiday that lasts a long time. RFK’s title “The Enemy Within” applies so well to these criminals.
I’m going to keep on praying for Patrick Fitzgerald.
Sounds plausible to me. Recommended.
I think you’ve got it.
I love the elephant following the peanuts!
I’m sending this to friends who need a morale boost, after one measly indictment didn’t comfort them.
exactly.
except you left out my chess analogy.
well done.
One thing that BooMan has pointed out: It’s very unusual for such criminals to serve consecutive sentences. BooMan heard that it’s most likely going to be 3+ years. That makes sense to me too.
And several pundits last night said much the same.
So you might edit that part of your diary, if you’re of a mind to.
Hey Susan :^)
FWIW, I liked that the diarist focused on the potential 30 years at hand. I think it serves as a very powerful reminder of the immense seriousness of the indictments – oh yeah, and the immense seriousness of Libby’s actions that landed him in this jam.
As far as the pundits go, I seem to be in disagreement with most. The ones I heard were pretty sure that Fitzgerald has nothing on Rove, or he would have handed Rove his share of indictments last week. I tend to think Fitzgerald is in the process of building a strong case, as meticulously and fairly as possible. I figure Libby’s obstruction and dishonesty can only serve to fuel Fitzgerald’s investigatory determination.
Yes, he now knows that Rove and that faction of the Republican party sold him out. He’s left holding the short straw. But that isn’t the faction he’s was protecting anyway. I don’t see him turning against the only faction that can protect him. His assurances are probably, keep your yap shut and we’ll get you pardoned. Talk and you’re going down with us.
I just don’t see Libby flipping on anybody. I think the best shot in nailing Rove’s ass is the cover up of the cover up. Somebody other than Libby can bust Rove’s lyin’ ass.
whats the difference between the republicans in power and the mafia?
if you are in the mafia you have to weigh snitching to get a lighter sentence with snitching and getting killed for it.
if you are in the govt you dont have to weigh anything…you will be pardoned so why deal or snitch?
if these people knew thay wouldnt be pardoned there would be a line of snitchers forming outside the gj.
shame someone cant put pressure on bush to promise he wont pardon anyone found guilty in this situation.
cant someone in the press briefing ask scotty if the president has plans to pardon anyone who goes down for his ship.
You’ve got varies factions vying for power and the spoils. Same thing here, you have the neocon faction and then the garden variety conservative faction. They are at war. The neocons aren’t interested in a political dynasty, they’re opportunists, out to grab as much as they can while they can. The garden variety conservatives are now facing the loss of their power, the neocon price has been too high for their political survival.
The best hope we have is a la Harriet Miers – the republican infighting will do what the sideline Dems cannot. Somebody’s going down for the lies that lead to this war, the only question is who and when.
A great extended comparison! I sure hope you’re right. You’ve certainly made my day a little brighter. I’ve been feeling low and frustrated from listening to the spec TV heads discuss this, with the neocons deciding it’s all settled. Thanks.
I want to see all their silly ,lying selves face down in the mud of their own making.
Good material for a crime novel. I doubt that there will be a trial. A trial would mean Cheney would have to testify under oath for the first time. (The special prosecutor interviewed both Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney last year, but not under oath. LINK)
There will be a pardon before there is ever a trial.
Fitzgerald is good but don’t underestimate the power of Cheney. How for example does he get off with an interview and not testifying under oath? Did Clinton get the same executive privilege? No.
Please stop all this. It is a total distraction.
HAS ANYONE EVER HEARD OF A PRESIDENTIAL PARDON?
Libby fights this to stay of out of prison as long as possible and is pardoned in 2008.
STOP WAISTING YOUR WORDS!!
Did you have to go and bring reality into this? (Sob!)
🙂
I just hate to see the collapse of critical thought on this site.
Don’t look at that sequence as a prediction. Look at it as a potential strategy that is open to Fitzgerald.
Yes, there are counters to it available to Cheney et. al. But as in a fencing match, those counters can be parried allowing a riposte.
With the current weakness of the Bush Presidency, many of the possible counters they will attempt aren’t going to work, and the ham-handed way they do things is just going to make things worse for them. One option is for Bush to fire Fitzgerald. But the Saturday Night Massacre didn’t work for Nixon. In fact it put him into much deeper doo doo.
Then there are the elections next year. Once the Democrats get one of the Houses of Congress back, then they have committees with subpoena power and the oversight function. Think of it. Active investigations into the Niger Forgeries, the Lies that led to the war in Iraq, the failure of the CPA under Bremer (I still want to know why Garner was fired – in specific), how Halliburton got its contracts and what it did with the money, investigations into the influence peddling in Congress as done by Tom DeLay and now Roy Blunt, and so on.
From the proper platform, it is what we in the Artillery used to call a “target-rich environment.”
Fitzgerald may or may not ‘turn’ Libby.
He may see Libby pardoned before trial.
He will simply move on to the next candidate on his list.
Then the next, the next, the next.
The White House knows this. They are therefore more likely to fire Fitzgerald than start issuing pardons.
Firing him, they dare not do, politically. It is an admission of total guilt. Yet, politically it is the only option.
These boys are good and stuck.
But didn’t Fitzgerald say in his presser that he wasn’t looking into anything other than the leak case, ie. Niger forgeries or the evidence for war.
This is simply an indictment that says, in a national security investigation about the compromise of a CIA officer’s identity that may have taken place in the context of a very heated debate over the war, whether some person — a person, Mr. Libby — lied or not.
The indictment will not seek to prove that the war was justified or unjustified. This is stripped of that debate, and this is focused on a narrow transaction.
And I think anyone’s who’s concerned about the war and has feelings for or against shouldn’t look to this criminal process for any answers or resolution of that.
So as much as I’d love to see him work his way up, he pretty much says he’s not and we shouldn’t pin our hopes to him.
“THIS INDICTMENT is not about the war…”
“THIS INDICTMENT is not about the property of the war…”
“…and people who have mixed feelings about it should not look to “THIS INDICTMENT” for any resolution how they feel…”
“…THIS is simply an indictment that says….”
“THE INDICTMENT will not seek to prove that the war…”
“THIS is stripped of that debate and THIS is focused on a narrow transaction.”
“…anyone’s who’s concerned about the war and has feelings for or against shouldn’t look to THIS Criminal process for any answers or resolution of that.”
I could be dreaming but perhaps it’s not THIS indictment that we have been waiting for, perhaps it’s another one to come.
“And I think anyone’s who’s concerned about the war and has feelings for or against shouldn’t look to this criminal process for any answers or resolution of that.”
It’s o.k. to dream, but I’m just trying to keep at least one foot grounded in reality.
He has 3 years of delays and appeals ahead of him. By which time George will be packing his bags and will pardon him. At most he serves a couple of months in Club Fed where he can polish up his backhand and get started on his book.
Can we please lose the aroma therapy diaries on the front page. Denial, anger, bargaining, acceptance.
Hope is nice. False hope isn’t.
They’ve gotten away with it. Because they are good at it. Lots of practice. Kept it deniable. Kept it compartmentalized.
THis is what Dean was writing about. The foreknowledge and the motivation is clear to us but not to Fitz. IF he hasn’t bought in to it at this point, no further factual knowledge will do the trick. And there will be no further factual knowledge developed in this case. The fat lady just sang her song and it is over.
Nope.
False hope would be Fitzgerald closing down one Grand Jury and not empanelling another one.
That didn’t happen.
Rove is next — whatever Libby does or does not do. Libby only has the choice to earn brownie points by helping Fitz nail Rove sooner. That’s all.
Go cry in your beer if you want to. You still have a merry Fitzmas coming.
False hope would be Fitzgerald closing down one Grand Jury and not empanelling another one.
Not his call. He didn’t close it down, it ended by statute. He didn’t open up another. That’s automatic.
Libby has no inmcentive whatsoever to rat out Rove or anyone else and lots of incentive to remain silent. In incentives analysis your logic doesn’t add up. There aren’t any smoking guns and none are going to be found if they haven’t been identified by now.
Fitzgerald has a new Grand Jury at his disposal Monday morning. It seems a safe wager that he’ll use it.
You raise an excellent point — Libby’s incentive to cooperate. As in, why not just ride this out until pardoned?
Because this is the opening indictment. Fitz has shown Libby his gun, with five cylinders loaded, and said ‘let’s talk one more time — because everything you’ve said so far is a proven lie. Say something else or I’ll show you my rifle as well.’
Crude metaphor, I know, but very real on the receiving end, as Libby knows tonight. Why, as Libby’s head hit the pillow this evening, he told himself, “Self, that SOB has me cold turkey on twice as much and twice as bad as he’s charged me with. Why O why did I ever screw that pooch? Where was Ashcroft when the shit hit the fan? He was supposed to have my back! Goddammed Bible-thumpin’ faggot. Him n’ his Crisco can go . . .”
May I also suggest:
Libby knows there is always some risk that pardon may be delayed, a great while perchance,
Libby knows he can be called to testify under oath at the Wilsons’ civil trial — more legal trouble, and no pardon will help with that,
Libby knows other persons in the White House can rat on the big boys and snatch Libby’s deal out from under him,
Libby knows exquisitely well that the political winds are blowing hurricane force against Bush and Friends, and this is far more likely to get worse not better, meaning the Senate may have to hold hearings against their will, and Bush may face riots and impeachment hearings is he issues pardons,
Libby knows he cannot stand on anything he has said to date — before he says a word he’s going to ask what do you want from me?
I feel he has plenty of incentive to get off his pedestal and drop a dime on his buddies.
Could you be wrong?
Could I be wrong? Could I be wrong?
No. I was born of a virgin. My mother is a gypsy. We were twins, but I cooked and ate my brother to prove myself to the clan. My first crystal ball once belonged to Rasputin. There were rumors in ’98 of me being wrong, but I’ve left no witnesses to that little incident, so fuggedaboudid.
Be of good cheer — Fitzmas is still coming. I have the heart of a child. Several of them, actually. I’ve never harmed anyone who stuck to discussing ideas instead of gettin’ all ad hominem on my ass, like askin’ if I could be wrong. Ridiculous questions like that get the ol’ hairy eyeball right away.
Oh Antifa – my question was intended for NorCalJim – not YOU!
And for your response I wish I could give you many, many more 4’s!
Yikes! I didn’t even realize my question was “ad hominem” – it just sort of popped out.
Thanks for your original diary here.
Yah, I knew that. All over it, actually.
Ach — there’s the doorbell. Gotta run . . .
I think this is going to go on for a while. I think that it’s undeniably opened up the floodgates – finally – of the MSM debating the underlying justification (or lack thereof) for the war. I think that it gives shape to the unease and unhappiness of a majority of Americans with Bush and with Bush’s war. I think that the Wilsons are going to file the Mother of All Lawsuits and keep the wound bleeding.
Whether or not Libby does time, the questions won’t end.
Scene from a screenplay.
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High level 50-ish VP chief of staff type…call him Skeets. Skeets Parsons. Out jogging in the Fort Marcy Park area…right near where they found Vincent Foster. Suddenly three black cars pull up. One in front of him, one behind, and a stretch limousine to his left. Out of limo steps someone who looks very Secret Service…earpiece, suit, haircut…the works.
Secret Service #1: Step into this car please, Mr. Parsons. We have a problem. National Security, sir.
Parsons does as he is told. The Secret Service guy gets in behind him. Inside the car are the Vice President…Vice President Marshall…a driver and two other Secret Service looking men. BIG men. Serious men. Maybe just a little rougher around the edges than Secret Service men usually look.
Marshall: Sorry to bother you right now, Skeets, but this is an emergency. I’ll fill you in as we drive.
The cars take off in DC formation. Lead car, VIP car, follow car. No lights, no sirens. Helicopter shot that shows them clearly headed AWAY from DC. Road sign shot says “Langley – 2 mi.”
Skeets: Gee, boss. Where are we going?
Marshall: There’s been an accident, Skeets. We’re headed to a CIA hospital at Langley.
Skeets: Oh NO!!! What happened?
Marshall: Someone got shot.
Scooter: Who?
Marshall: You.
Both of the men in the back grab Parsons and pin him to the seat. The third man takes out a small pistol. Skeets struggles, but it’s no use.
Skeets: What!!!???? What!!!??? What did I do!!!???
Marshall: Well, asshole…you didn’t do anything. Yet. And I am here to make sure that you DON’T do anything.
Scooter: But boss!!! BOSS!!! You can count on ME!!!
Marshall: Yeah. Well, just to be sure…
Here’s the deal. The Special Prosecutor is going to charge you in a few weeks. He can’t get the President’s guy, but he’s got you right in the cross hairs. He’s going to indict you on about 30 years’ worth of charges.
Skeets: Yeah, but BOSS!!! You said that would work out. You said that it would take at LEAST a year or two for that to go to trial and that the President would pardon me if I was convicted!!!
Marshall: Well…things have changed.
Skeets impotently struggles a little more, but it’s hopeless.
Skeets; But boss!!! I won’t rat you out!!! You know me!!!
Marshall: Yeah. I know you. You glorified Yalie gofer. You’d rat out your mother if you had to. If I could, I’d just have you killed and be done with it. But I can’t. Too much publicity already. So here’s the deal. “Plato ó plomo?” Ever hear those words before?
Skeets: Nooo…
Marshall: Some of my…Mexican friends use the phrase. It means “Silver or lead?” They ask that question when they want someone to clearly understand the alternatives which are being offered.
Skeets: Huh???
Marshall: Shut up, asshole. Like I said…here’s the deal. We will back you all the way with the Special Prosecutor. We will get you the shortest sentence possible. And the President will pardon you if and when he can. But the way things are going, he may NOT be able to pardon you. You may have to do four or even five years.
Skeets: Oh NO!!!
Struggles some more.
Marshall slaps him across the face.
Marshall: Get your shit together!!! You knew what was at stake here!!! We’ll see to it that if you DO have to spend time in jail, it will be at a federal country club. No Bubbas to fuck with you, good food, even a fucking squash court and a computer to write another one of those weak-ass novels of yours.
PLUS…for every year that you are in jail, we will deposit $5 million in that offshore bank account of yours.
Skeets: “I have no bank…”
Marshall smacks him again.
Marshall: What? Do you think I’m STUPID? (Hits him a third time. Hard. Skeets folds.) I know every dirty deal you’ve run in the last 30 years. Why do you think I hired you in the FIRST place??? Those $5 millions? That’s the silver. The plato.
Driver: We’re almost there, sir.
Marshall nods. The Secret Service guy with the small gun leans over and shoots Skeets in the foot.
Skeets screams. Marshall hits him again, and Skeets’ holders tighten their grip on him until he stops thrashing and subsides into muffled sobs.
Marshall: And THAT’S the plomo!!! Just a little down payment. Something to remember us by. No Joe Valachi shit from YOU, motherfucker!!! ONE WORD about what’s really going down…ONE WORD…and I will kill you, your family, your boyfriend…yes, I know about that, too…and your mother as well.
Shock and awe, baby. Shock and awe…
YOU knew the deal.
Shot of the cars going through a side gate outside of CIA headquarters in Langley and directly into a tunnel beneath a large, anonymous looking building.
Back in the car…darker outside now, as if it is in an underground passageway. Shot of several men in hospital blues waiting outside the car with a stretcher.
Marshall: These nice men will fix your foot now. It’ll only hurt for a few months. Tommy knows his business. (Shot of the Secret Service type shooter giving a tight grin and nod of recognition.)
Marshall: But you WILL remember…
Won’t you.
Skeets is hobbled out of the limo, onto the stretcher dolly and wheeled away.
The cars disappear into the darkness at the end of the tunnel.
Fade to black.
Yup…
“Not a WORD, asshole…”
“Not one WORD!!!”
Yup…
AG
Excellent!
I can’t wait for the movie . . .
This needs a much wider audience.